CLEMENT, HAL (HARRY CLEMENT STUBBS) — Needle

Garden City, NY: Doubleday & Company, Inc, 1950. 1st Edition; 1st Printing. Hardcover. This book is in Very Good+ condition and has a Very Good+ dust jacket. The book and its contents are in clean, bright condition. The yellowish tan cloth covers have black lettering on the spine. The spine ends of the book covers have some lightish bumping. The text pages are generally clean and bright, though there is some light generalized toning throughout. The edges of the text block have noticeable toning and spots of foxing (mostly the top edge). The dust jacket is mostly clean and bright, but does have spots of rubbing and wear to the spine ends and corners. There is a very small poke / tear to the bottom front spine joint that a previous owner has repaired with a tiny bit of tape. "From 1949 to 1953, Clement's first three novels were two-, three-, and four-part Astounding serials under Campbell: Needle (Doubleday, 1950) , Iceworld (Gnome Press, 1953) , and Mission of Gravity (1954) , his best-known novel, published by Doubleday's Science Fiction Book Club (established 1953). The latter novel features a land and sea expedition across the superjovian planet Mesklin to recover a stranded scientific probe. The natives of Mesklin are centipede-like intelligent beings about 50 centimeters long. Various episodes hinge on the fact that Mesklin's fast rotational speed causes it to be considerably deformed from the spherical, with effective surface gravity that varies from approximately 3 gn at the equator to approximately 700 gn at the poles. " (from Wikipedia). Very Good+ in Very Good+ dust jacket .